That MSNBC Interview Was Not the First Time Kellyanne Conway Referred to the "Bowling Green Massacre"

Kellyanne Conway took to Twitter on Friday to walk back her comments on MSNBC's Hardball about a nonexistent terrorist attack in Bowling Green, Kentucky. However, this wasn't the first time she used the words "Bowling Green massacre" in an on-the-record conversation with a reporter.

In an earlier interview with Cosmopolitan.com, she not only used this same phrase but also went a step further in describing the actions of the two Iraqi men involved in the case to which she was referring. Defending the president's executive order banning non-U.S. citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the country for 90 days on Hardball With Chris Matthews, Conway invoked what she called the "Bowling Green massacre." "I bet it's brand-new information to people that President Obama had a six-month ban on the Iraqi refugee program after two Iraqis came here to this country, were radicalized, and they were the masterminds behind the Bowling Green massacre," she told Matthews. Roundly condemned and mocked for the comment (there has never been a terrorist massacre in Bowling Green), Conway tweeted Friday that she meant to say "Bowling Green terrorists" and had made an "honest mistake."

But in an interview with Cosmopolitan.com conducted by phone days earlier, on Sunday, January 29, Conway used the same phrasing, claiming that President Obama called for a temporary "ban on Iraqi refugees" after the "Bowling Green massacre." (The quotes did not appear in either of twostories recently published on Cosmopolitan.com.)

"He did, it's a fact," she said of Obama. "Why did he do that? He did that for exactly the same reasons. He did that because two Iraqi nationals came to this country, joined ISIS, traveled back to the Middle East to get trained and refine their terrorism skills and come back here and were the masterminds behind the Bowling Green massacre of taking innocent soldiers' lives away." Conway was referencing the case of two Iraqi men, Mohanad Shareef Hammadi and Waad Ramadan Alwan, who entered the U.S. under the guise of refugees in 2009 and were arrested in 2011 in Bowling Green, Kentucky, on charges related to terrorism. But when Cosmopolitan.com reached out to the FBI to verify details of Conway's account, a spokesman wrote in an email that "a couple of your facts seem incorrect" and provided a link to a Justice Department press release, which, he said, "outlines all the public information and timeline." According to the release, the men "admitted using improvised explosive devices (IEDs) against U.S. soldiers in Iraq" and "attempted to send weapons and money to al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) for the purpose of killing U.S. soldiers." Both pleaded guilty to federal terrorism charges. But the DOJ release makes no mention of the men returning to the Middle East for training. The May 2011 indictmentandcomplaints do not mention the men returning to the Middle East at any time for training either.

Court documents from the case also make clear that the men were radicalized before coming to the U.S. Alwanadmitted to planting an IED on a road in Iraq in an attempt to kill U.S. troops at some point between 2003 and 2006. Neither man was ever charged with plotting attacks on United States soil.

As a result of the men's arrests, the Department of Homeland Security rescreened 58,000 refugees in the U.S. already, vetted an additional 25,000 Iraqis still in Iraq, and toughened the visa application process for Iraqi refugees for six months. The changes prolonged the immigration process for Iraqi refugees, but did not "ban" them. Reached for comment Friday afternoon, Conway told Cosmopolitan.com by text message, "It was a plot to massacre and they were Bowling Green terrorists. That's what I should have said. I clarified." "Those were evil men who bragged about attacking American soldiers," she said.

Asked specifically where she got her information about the men joining ISIS and going back to the Middle East for training, she said, "I know when they were radicalized and received a briefing."

In a follow-up text exchange on Sunday night, Conway wrote, "Frankly they were terrorists in Bowling Green but their massacre took place in Iraq. At least this got clear-thinking people to focus on what did happen in Bowling Green. I gave new life to that ABC News investigative report and the fact that these two Iraqi nationals came to the US with a plan of death and destruction."

Asked again about her claim that the men went back to the Middle East and why that wasn't in court documents, she said she couldn't answer that.

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